PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE: This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus use an image from my favorite sport, golf. Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and a private sector lobbyist. This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

The question in the headline has occurred to me several times over the last weeks as we have seen a new president, Donald Trump, take office and engage, like he did in the campaign, in an unpredictable array of fulminations and actions – fulminations and actions that may or may not be hinged to reality.

So, are we seeing facts or are we seeing developments made up, not just by the Administration, but by Democrat detractors, or the media, the latter of which has been labeled by the Administration as “the opposition party?”

In a piece in the Wall Street Journal, columnist Bret Stephens called Trump “our first post-rational president.”

The full quote from the Stephens piece:

“The United States has elected as president a man who has repeatedly voiced his disdain for NATO, the World Trade Organization and other institutions of the Western-led world order. He publicly calls the press “an enemy of the American people” and conjures conspiracy theories about voter fraud whose only purpose is to lend credence to his claim that the system is rigged. He is our first post-rational president, whose approach to questions of fact recalls the deconstructionism of the late Jacques Derrida: There are no truths; reality is negotiable.

In this quote, think about two phrases. One, Trump is “the post-rational president!” Some would argue with this label, of course, but, based on facts in recent days, it strikes me that it could be true.

The other phrase: “There are no truths; reality is negotiable.” If that is true, we, as a country or as a civilization, are in deep trouble.

I choose to believe that there is reality – underpinnings that provide a pivot for all of us as we live and act. We may not always agree with the reality, but there is one.

Those who were tired of the Obama Administration saw Trump as their savior, someone who would bring a new reality to Washington, D.C., one based on quick action to, as Trump would put, “make America great again.”

Those who opposed Trump saw him as either a buffoon or near-dictator who thought he always knew best about any issue – and clearly much better than either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, the latter of whom struck many as Obama 3.

Just rely on me, Trump would say – I’ll save you. His was a new kind of ego-centric reality.

For many, the Trump “make America again” quote conjured up images of what it must have been like in post-World War 1 Germany as Adolph Hitler rose to power by invigorating the masses to follow his lead no matter where it took Germany.

So, in this day and age, how are we to separate fact from fiction, how are we to decide if there is reality and, if so, what it is?

Without putting myself on any sort of pedestal, I follow these paths on a daily basis to try to find reality:

• First, I read several newspapers every day, often in my hands so I can touch the ink, which I like based on my past as a reporter for a daily newspaper. The alternative is to go on-line, which is second best, but still available.

• Second, the ones I read are designed to provide multiple sides of the public policy challenges we face – the Oregonian in my home state, the Washington Post (from the left) editorial columns, the entire Wall Street Journal (from the right) and an on-line version of the New York Times. Multiple sides. Multiple perspectives.

• Third, I try to communicate with a number of my friends, not because they agree with me, but because they have perspectives to contribute that very often are different than mine. There is a risk in talking only to those with whom you agree so that you think your way is the only right way.

• Fourth, I post my thoughts from time to time in this blog, Perspective from the 19^th Hole, and then read what reactors say about what I have written.

In these ways, I try to discern reality without some kind of haughty view that I have found IT. All of us should work to find it, not just hew to perspectives that mimic our own.

And this footnote, which probably should be higher in this blog, if not the lead.  My reality is formed by my conviction that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth and the life.  As a follower of Jesus, I am able — again not in a haughty way — to put what I read and see about life and politics in a wider context.